Possessed by the New Alpha

Anais Stay summoned the elevator to the sixth floor of her friend's building. Kristen Raines had sounded panicky and anxious and wanted her to come over. She was usually tolerant and understanding when her friend Kristen had these 'emergencies' but today she had been extremely exhausted having dedicated most of her time to babysitting her nephew and battling some serious writer's block. She just wanted to go home, take a bath and get a few hours sleep in order to wake up again to work on her book for at least three hours.

While she enjoyed writing, she was having difficulty getting the words to flow for the latest romance novel under her nom de plume Jennifer White.

"Oh God, Ana I'm so glad you came. You're such a good friend" Kristen embraced her and bustled her into the apartment.

"Kristen, I can't stay long..." she stopped mid sentence and realized that she was in the middle of a party that was in full swing. She had been so caught up in her thoughts that she hadn't heard the music.

"Are you having a party?"

"Yes, silly. I just need some help in the kitchen. I thought I booked the caterer but I didn't confirm and now all these people are here and I have nothing but chips and dip. You got to work your magic Ana, please"

"Couldn't you order take out?" Anais asked.

"I could but their appetizers aren't like yours..."

Her plea was genuine and Anais knew that she needed her, but too many times she had found herself being taken advantage of because of her kind nature. Kristen needed to organize herself better and stop thinking of her as her "go to" gal. She would talk to her about it later, that and the fact that she hadn't even invited her to the party that she now had to save.

"I'll see what I can do Kristen but please keep people from coming in there to bother me okay" she managed to say.

After gauging the number of persons present, she ordered some main dishes from Aurora's Kitchen and made her way to Kristen's large but underutilized kitchen to work on some simple appetizers. She started prepping dough for mini pizzas and then cut fillers for some shrimp kebabs.

Kristen had good intentions but lacked basic organization skills. She enjoyed the company of others but was seldom ever prepared for it. She would start off by asking one person over and before she knew it, there would be ten to fifteen people in her apartment.

Putting the finishing touches on the pizzas she stuck them in the oven, put the shrimp on a grill and prepared a fruit platter. Wiping her brow in frustration, she sat down to take a breather.

"Ana, people are getting a bit restless. What do you have?"

It had been less than twenty minutes since she had been in the kitchen and was a bit peeved by Kristen's interruption.

"You can take the fruit out and I can give you the kebabs. Just hold on a minute and I'll lay them out..."

"Why don't you bring them out, I'll take the fruit out and buy some time..." Kristen started to say.

Buy some time? She hated the way that Kristen made it seem as though she was the one who was late in her preparations. Before she could say anything, Kristen was out the door with the fruit.

"Great. I'll just do that because that's what I'm here for." She mumbled and turned to the kebabs and placed them in a tray, trying her best to resist the urge to pound them against the silver.

"Hi. Do you have whipped cream?"

That was it! It was the one thing she had asked Kristen to do. Keep people out of the kitchen! She was so angry she could cry! And she was quite sure that it showed when she shot the offender the look.

"Okay...I'll come back then" he said slowly. He clearly read her 'get lost' expression but hadn't seen her well hidden reaction to his appearance. He was tall, maybe 6'4"and well built. She could tell his muscles were well chiseled even though he was wearing a shirt. His movements were lithe.

A day's worth of stubble covered his angular jaw and made him all the more appealing. Stark grey eyes threatened to take her breath away but she hid it well.

She watched him turn to leave and resumed packing the tray but she almost jumped when she heard him behind her.

"I can do that" he said, holding the edges of the tray.

She maintained her grasp and stared back at him intently.

He was the most beautiful man she had ever seen and she hadn't expected him to affect her the way that he did.

Perhaps that was what made her let go of the tray...maybe his looks was what was making her knees feel weak and cause this strange feeling inside of her belly...one that wasn't pain, but made her ache. Gosh, maybe it was because he smelt so good or maybe it was the way he was looking at her with those wonderful grey eyes. It was all so confusing, all too intense. She had to say something...

"Thank you" she said looking away from him and trying to busy herself with some PB&J sandwiches.

When she felt him leave, she looked up and started to breathe again. She needed a fan or a respirator or something...because she was feeling overheated. She mixed pancake batter and dipped the miniature square sandwiches in them before immersing them in the deep fryer.

"What are you doing?"

Fuck, he snuck up on her again! She could feel his hot breath on her as he looked over her shoulder.

"Do you mind? You could've made me burn myself"

"Sorry...I was just curious. I only left for like a minute and you were on to something else" He seemed amused at her obvious attempts to ignore him.

"By the way, my name is Jonathan Hughes. I uh...I found the whipped cream" he said dangling the can in front of her face.

"Okay Jonathan, do you mind giving me some space here" she said, still not looking at him but shoving him out of the way as she transferred her creation from the oil to napkins and drizzled them with powdered sugar.

"You know, a name would be nice" he laughed, still standing too close.

"Just because you go around introducing yourself to random strangers doesn't mean that I have to" she said trying to deliver another hard stare.

"I was talking about the name of whatever it is you made, but I would like to know your name since you brought it up."

"You don't need to know" she said looking away again. He had a devilish smile and really, really inappropriate thoughts went through her mind.

"I don't?" he was trying to get to her once again.

"No. All you have to do is eat it and enjoy." She said, pointing to the peanut butter and jelly dish.

"Oh, I'm not in the habit of eating nameless things but I think for you, I'll make an exception"

She blushed and swore that it was a shade of bright red against her light skin tone.

"Anais...Anais Stay" she supplied, continuing her ministrations on the tarts.

"Anais" he repeated. "So Anais, I think I prefer your company rather than go out there despite the fact that you're doing your darndest to ignore me"

He was persistent, she'd give him that, but wasn't in the mood for this kind of game.

"These are really good" he said, his mouth full of tart. "What's in it?"

"Soft bread, peanut butter, jelly, pancake mix with cinnamon and spice powder" she said dryly.

"So are you a chef ..."

"No, I'm not" she realized she had cut him off a bit too abruptly when he held up his hands in surrender. She was distracted by his antics and only felt when the pain transmitted to the part of her brain that was actually working. Oil had pitched from the pot onto her right hand.

"Crap.Ouch Ouch !!" she ran her hand under the tap and was about to examine the damage when she felt him at her side grabbing up her hand and performing a brief inspection.

The contact was electric. Something went off inside of her that caused the tingling in her belly to return. It was absolutely unnatural for a simple touch to make her so aware of him. God, he smelt so good! If she had to describe him in just one word, it would be delicious.

He was handsome to a blood boiling point and looked at her in a way that made her giddy. She was sure that she saw the same shock reflected in his eyes when their eyes met. She wasn't sure how much time had passed from the moment he took her hand to when he released her and grinned.

"Have dinner with me tomorrow night." he handed her his business card and looked at her with a mischievous glint in his eyes.

"I don't think so", she said flatly. There was no way she was going to go out with Mr. Wonderful. He spelt trouble and she had no time for that. She turned away from his piercing gaze.

"Do you usually look at men the way that you just looked at me?" he asked, lifting her chin and forcing her to look at him once more.

"No, I don't actually" It wasn't what she wanted to say but something else seemed to be responding for her. It was not her body that this fire was snaking through...not her voice that responded to him, not her lips that wanted to be kissed...

"Then say yes" he was a hair's breath away from her lips and by the time the words started coming out, his lips slanted over hers.

"Yes" she said weakly against his lips.

She had never been kissed like that before. It was unexpected, slow but so full of heat she thought she would have combusted. It was a pleasurable kind of heat that she felt through her entire body. When he deepened the kiss and his tongue did a mad dance with hers, the heat pooled in her belly causing sensations that she had never felt before and causing her body to open itself to him. His hands felt so right when he cupped her face and gently massaged the sensitive area behind her ear with his thumb.

Where was the air? She knew that she needed to breathe, but to hell with it if it meant breaking that kiss or moving away from the rock hard body that was now pressed against hers.

"Sweet" he said, ending the kiss by licking her lips and gently tugging at her lower lip.

"You're the sweetest thing I ever tasted" His thumb now traced the outline of her lips as though he was branding her.

He reached behind her and she realized that he was making a call...from her phone. He looked at his phone and she realized that he had dialled his own number in order to record her number.

"Go out with me." He said. She wasn't sure if it was a question or a command. "I have a plane to catch in the morning but I need to see you." he looked at his watch and shook his head.

"To. See. Me?" She gradually came out of her catatonic state.

"Yes..." He replied. "There is something in you that calls to me." His explanation stunned her.

He continued, "I have some things to wrap up but I'll call you and my driver is going to pick you up in about an hour and a half." He seemed to be in total control as though he was a walking organizer.

She nodded and agreed with everything that he said as though her brain no longer functioned.

He turned to leave and then she thought to ask, "What am I supposed to wear?"

"Anything that's easy to come off"

He left her open-mouthed and speechless.